cflsteve wrote:I kind of jumped the gun when discussing University football in the Atlantic region. In doing quite a bit corresponding with coaches, Commish, Players, and fans in the Atlantic Football League it does not appear that any of the for teams has any interested in joining the CIS in the near future and are more than content but rather estatic about being a part of the AFL.
UNBF is the main sports campus of the two UNB schools and have been having a great homecoming game among other things vs the other campus at UNBSJ. UNBSJ will in turn be facing off against their rival campus for a homecoming game of their own in 2013. Local players are flocking to these two teams whether attending the Main Campus, the local Community College or somewhere in between with a player fee of 300 dollars.
Holland Junior collage and UPEI also have a similar set up with players from both Universities using the UPEI Campus facilities but mainly sponsored by Holland.
DAL is the only University in the AFL that requires all players to be students at the University but being just minutes form SMU have had no trouble getting local players from the Largest Metro Region in Halifax who may not be up to CIS level but are nicely fit into the Atlantic Football League.
Cape Breton who had a CIS team briefly in the 90's but cost and recruiting made it nearly impossible and the Commish and others asscciated with the AFL had confirmed CBU interst in reviving their football program but a t a much lower cost using the UNB campus' model.
Distance from the Capers to the UNB schools seems to be a question of concern. However, for a league who Mission is for University/Comunity football at a reasonable rate would be very willing to make it work. Perhaps a schedule where UNB schools only play the Capers once each season instead of twice. That would mean the the Capers would only have to make one long road trip a season to one of the UNB campuses while the two UNB cmapus' rotate home one season against the capers and away the next with teams doing this on opposite years. This would give the AFL a 7 game league season with the option of their bye week to schedule a non conference opponent. Which have included over the past three years a DIII JV team from Maine as well as Acadia putting together a JV team for a game one season.
I get the sense that their is much more excitement at the current 4 AFL schools as a whole that the 4 AUS schools.
SMU will always be the darlings in the big Halifax region with Acadia who has had their couple of years on top always being second in Nova Scotia. STFX and MOUNT A have had success in the past. FX not so long ago in the AUS and MNT A a lot longer and no team from the AUS has been competative on the National level since SMU of a decade ago.
A lot of changes where made to the CIS football landscape back in the late 70's and 80's it could be that there will be some changes made again do to the cost of a football program in the AUS.
Time will teall

I like the idea of 2nd tier university or college leagues. Not everybody can compete at a high level. Neither the AFL nor AUS can afford to lose any teams, so best that they each have 4.

However, I would like to see the AUS merge withthe RSEQ. Then they would have a nice big league with several different opponents.